Police awaiting autopsy results in death of Bath baby

BATH, Maine — The circumstances behind the weekend death of a 9-month-old Windjammer Way girl are being investigated by state and local police.

Maine Department of Public Safety spokesman Steve McCausland said Monday that an autopsy has been performed on the body of Jaelyn Malcolm, but results were not yet available.

No one had been charged with a crime in the case as of Monday morning, McCausland said.

Malcolm was brought to Mid-Coast Hospital in Brunswick at 4:30 a.m. June 20 by her 21-year-old mother, Danielle Malcolm, and Malcolm’s boyfriend, 29-year-old Benjamin McNeill. The couple allegedly told hospital staff that the child was injured the evening of June 19 and they were concerned about “a change in Jaelyn’s behaviors,” according to a June 21 press release by McCausland.

After determining the injuries were serious, McCausland said, hospital officials transferred the infant to Maine Medical Center in Portland, where she died the night of June 21.

“The main focus is, this child appears to have died of injuries, and we’re trying to get as much information as we can as to what exactly happened,” McCausland said, declining to go into more detail about those injuries.

Police have interviewed Malcolm and McNeill, family members, friends and hospital staff in the hopes of finding the possible nature and cause of the injuries, and all parties have been cooperating with the investigation, McCausland said.

“The state police investigate all children’s deaths under the age of 3,” he explained, noting that results of the autopsy being performed by the state medical examiner will be “a key component of this investigation.”

Malcolm wrote on her Facebook page June 21 that her daughter had suffered a stroke that caused the left side of her brain to swell and bleed, and made her unable to use that side of the body. The mother said the child was placed in a medically induced coma to help decrease the swelling of the brain, but that it did not help.

“She’s On A Machine To Help Her Breathe And Stay Alive; I Have One Of The Hardest Decisions Of My Life Coming Up … That Little Girl Is My Life,” she wrote.

After her daughter’s death, Malcolm wrote, “My Babies Gone; Mommy Never Left Her Side; Mommy Doesnt Want To Leave Her Now; Now Just Looking For Answers; I Just Wanna Know What Happened To My Precious Baby Girl.”